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This colorful booklet lists all the ritual items needed for the Passover table. The history and significance of each item on the seder plate is explained, as are the customs that have been handed down through the generations in different centers of Jewish life.

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This never struck Levy as odd, because her mother used to make noodle pudding on Thanksgiving. "Her Thanksgiving dinners were almost like Shabbat meals," she says.

One of Levy's all-time favorite dishes is Thanksgiving potato kugel with asparagus. "I first tried it at the home of a friend from Colorado," she says, explaining that it was his grandmother's recipe. "In his family, that dish was the essence of Thanksgiving."

Levy, author of 1,000 Jewish Recipes, has sprinkled Thanksgiving dishes throughout this enormous international compendium. Why did she feel the necessity to include American harvest fare in a Jewish cookbook?

Honoring the feast shared by Native Americans and English settlers in the Massachusetts colony so long ago, Jews are naturally drawn to a holiday that revolves around a meal.

While Levy grew up in home that was both Ashkenazi and kosher, like other Americans her family always ate turkey and cranberries on Thanksgiving.

"We just skipped the creamed onions," she says, referring to the Jewish dietary restriction that prohibits serving dairy with meat.

A child of the 50s, Levy has memories of her mother's candied sweet potatoes, dripping with brown sugar syrup and topped with melted marshmallows. Popular back then, this dish is still on the Thanksgiving menu in many American homes.

Recalling Thanksgivings past, Levy describes an aunt who used to mash sweet potatoes, form them into patties and fry them. Just before serving, she'd melt a marshmallow on top of each patty. Proud of this recipe, her aunt also bestowed it with a name: "Thanksgiving Latkes."

Today, Levy--a graduate of the famed La Varenne Cooking School in Paris--prefers mixing sweet potatoes with savory spices. "You can really taste the flavor of sweet potatoes through ginger and hot peppers, as opposed to mixing them with sugary foods."

With her culinary training, Levy avoids roasting really large turkeys, say over 18 pounds. She's discovered that while you're waiting for the inside to cook through, the outside often burns or dries out. You're also more likely to have problems with bacteria. For large crowds, she recommends roasting two smaller turkeys weighing about 12 pounds each.

For extra kick, Levy serves this turkey with hot cumin sauce, which is tomato based and accented with spices. She feels exposure to her husband's Sephardi palate has given her an appreciation of piquant flavor.

As a chef, Levy is drawn to the fruits of the season's final harvest. She seeks Thanksgiving fare wherever she goes. In compiling her book Feast from the Middle East: 250 Sun-Drenched Dishes from the Lands of the Bible, she included recipes such as Iranian sweet and savory rice stuffing with cranberry toasted almonds.

When it comes to Thanksgiving food, there's no end to the possibilities one can cull from the canons of Jewish cuisine. Surprisingly, many Jewish foods are easily adapted to compliment the holiday's traditional fare.

If you have leftover challah in the freezer, try making challah stuffing, a light but savory surprise. Levy follows her mother's custom of creating contrast by introducing peppers, mushrooms and zucchini to slices of sweet challah.

Thanksgiving tzimmes augments the taste of turkey, no matter how it's prepared. Instead of the usual prunes, dried cranberries lend a colorful note to this saucy combination of carrots and pineapple.

With a crunchy crumb topping, pecan streusel pears are an easy-to-make dessert that is both sensational and pareve.

These days, Levy and her husband usually celebrate Thanksgiving with friends. Even when she's invited as a guest, she roasts a turkey to have at home. Turkeys are economical to buy in late November, and it's fun to have one to nibble on and use as an ingredient in other recipes, such as a robust vegetable soup.

"We're kind of casual about holidays," says Levy. "Whenever we get together with family and friends--even on Thanksgiving--we do a lot of pot luck. This way, one person isn't stuck cooking for a lot of people."

Sometimes this group coordinates who will prepare which dishes; sometimes they don't. Of course one person is always designated as the turkey roaster.

1. Drain pineapple and reserve 1/4 cup juice. Mix reserved juice with the cornstarch in a cup.
2. Combine carrots with 2 cups water and a pinch of salt in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil. Cover and cook over low heat about 12 minutes, or until just tender. Remove carrots with slotted spoon.
3. Add honey to carrot cooking liquid and bring to a simmer, stirring.
4. Mix juice-cornstarch mixture to blend. Add to simmering liquid, stirring. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring, until sauce comes to a simmer and thickens.
5. Stir in carrots, cranberries, pineapple, ginger and cloves. Heat until bubbling.
6. Season with salt and pepper. Serve hot.
Yield: 4 servings

1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Peel and slice pears. Put them in a bowl. Mix cornstarch and 1/4 cup of the brown sugar in a small bowl. Add to pears. Add lemon juice and toss to combine.
3. Grease a shallow, square 9-inch baking dish. Spoon mixture inside.
4. Mix remaining 1/4 cup brown sugar with flour in a small bowl. With 2 knives, cut margarine into mixture until coarse crumbs form. Add pecans and oats. Stir lightly with a fork. Sprinkle mixture evenly over fruit.
5. Bake about 30 minutes, or until topping is golden and pears are tender. Serve warm or cool in bowls.
Yield: 6 servings

Having Jewish family origins in Germany or Eastern Europe.Having Jewish family origins in Spain, Portugal or North Africa. The term literally means "Spanish" in Hebrew.A bread that comes in a few different varieties; its most common variation is a braided egg bread, though there are water challahs that don't have eggs, and there are whole-wheat challahs which sometimes also don't have eggs. It is customary to being Sabbath and holiday meals by saying blessings and eating challah.The Jewish Sabbath, from sunset on Friday to nightfall on Saturday.Hebrew for "fit" (as in, "fit for consumption"), the Jewish dietary laws.Yiddish word for a potato pancake, traditionally eaten during Hanukkah.Hebrew word for an unleavened bread, traditionally eaten during the holiday of Passover.Yiddish word for a savory or sweet pudding made from either noodles, potatoes or matzah.